Entertainment For Lively Minds
Charlie Brooker on the Xmas number one
Charlie Brooker got more engaged in the Christmas number one story than I could manage by downloading RATM. His piece was written before the chart was announced of course, and I suspect it sayS a lot that Word readers would like to say if we could work up sufficiently articulate bile.
Even if the climactic repeated howls of "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me!" put you in mind of a teenager loudly refusing to tidy his bedroom – as opposed to a masked anarchist hurling petrol bombs at the riot squad – there is at least an authentic human sentiment being expressed. Zack de la Rocha is audibly pissed off ...
But then nobody's buying The Climb in order to actually listen to it. They're buying it out of sedated confusion, pushing a button they've been told will make them feel better. It's the sound of the assisted suicide clinic...
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Frankly, bollocks
There is no more stupid and snobbish argument than the one that says you know *how* and why people are listening to things. You don't. The same Guardian columnists used to say the same things about Abba back in the day.
Speaking of stupid and snobbish
I'd give the award to Barbara Ellen for this piece yesterday.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/20/joe-mcelderry-rage-a...
Myself
and Barbara Ellen are the only two people in the world to have made the point that Rage have the better pop song. If Joe had come off the blocks with Sound of the Underground, say, then he would have deserved to win, but The Climb is rubbish.
Isn't the whole thrust of
Isn't the whole thrust of Ellen's piece anti-snobbism? And how is it "stupid"? I agree with her arguement completely.
I'd rather listen to RATM, but is The Climb really that bad? It's no better of worse than 90% of the records that have made the top ten this year, and it's got several memorable hooks. The lyrics are also perfect for an X Factor winner.
In fact, I might rouse myself from my sedated confusion for the few seconds it will take to press a button to download it because I've been told it will make me feel better (wow, isn't Charlie "rent-a-rant" Brooker just so, like, insightful yeah?).
Stupid
in as much as she seems to think RATM engineered this, which they didn't, and carps about the invalidity of their "messgae" because it's over 20 years old.
To my mind, Rage and their cronies aren't doing this for the people, they are sneering at the taste of the people. Indeed, it says something, that, while those who like X Factor mainly think it's a laugh, it's the people who hate X Factor – the middle class, the petty – who take it too seriously and end up dictating to others what they should be watching, liking, hearing, and buying.<\i>
Just as Brooker knows how and why people listen to stuff,Babs knows I'm middle class - and even worse "petty" - because of I don't like X Factor. Reverse snobbery in my book.
Ellen doesn't say in her
Ellen doesn't say in her piece that RATM engineered being at number One (although she doesn't mention the facebook campaign either) or anything about their message being invalid, but in response to Tom Morello's assertion that, "It represents a great victory for cutting-edge music and the voice of the people" she does say "if you're trying to make a point about "the cutting edge", instead of using a song that is nearly 20 years old, perhaps you should get off your backside and produce something that is – what's the word again – oh, yes, new."
Why does Barbara Ellen
Why does Barbara Ellen dislike the middle class so much?
I bet she ticks more middle class boxes than a 'Terry & June Christmas Special'.
My girlfriend gets the Observer and I've routinely avoided her piece for about six years now; in fact, I've routinely avoided about 95% of the paper.
Anyway if we left popular culture to the working class where would we be?
Oh yeah, we have!
Up to a point Lord Copper
I have some sympathy with Brooker's line as I think he is right when he says that people buy the X Factor single because it has become something that they do, regardless of the song. I have heard the song as I enjoy the X Factor tremendously as great telly. Had it been a hit through, let's say, airplay on Radio 2, without the massive marketting of the programme behind it I would have been bemused by its success but wouldn't have doubted that people were buying it because they decided that they wanted it in their lives.
Brooker of course is a professional splenetecist, but on this occaision I think he's got it broadly right.
The ones who bought a record "because it was something to do"...
...were surely the ones who bought the other record, weren't they?
The ones who bought RATM
Very likely they didn't buy it because they spontaneously decided that they suddenly wanted an old shouty song on their iTunes. They were of course just as manipulated in their own way as those whom I accuse of unthinkingly doing the bidding of the producers of the X Factor (and let's not forget that the increased publicity can only have benefitted sales of McEddery's record and hence Cowell).
Where they differ is that those who plumped for RATM took a side and expressed an opinion, and turned the chart into a news story rather than a pre-determined top spot for the X Factor winner, who or whatever it turned out to be. I'm wary of giving them too much credit because, as has been widely pointed out, their is a great irony in an organised campaign based around a chant of 'Fuck you I wont do what you tell me.' But maybe they appreciated the irony too. Doubtless it's equally snobbish of me to ascribe motives to people who bought either track.
@ Gatz
"They were of course just as manipulated in their own way"
since i'm just in from the pub, and a great believer in this board as a civilised space, i'm not going to write the phrase that first popped into my head because it's a bit rude
instead, i'll say simply that 12 months ago, i sat in my brother's mate's family living room and alongside two couples, four kids and a lot of M&S snacks, was subjected to the X Factor final ... the memory's a blur ... it wasn't pleasant (and i may be conflating it with another evening which seemed to be a run-on of "I'm a celebrity bug-eating jungle dancer with a tragic backstory and Bruce Forsyth on ice factor", or similar)
on one occasion, i'm sure i plugged into the available wi-fi with my laprop and spent the evening downloading a Julian Cope album from iTunes (bits of which reminded me of an ex girlfriend and actually made me cry, just about, as oppposed to the ersatz, manipulative drivel spewing out of the flatscreen on the wall) ...
so when a mate mentioned this year that the whole miserable circus could be marginally derailed by the expedient of spending 99p (which i did) my attitude was, well, those who live by the new media channels (VOTE VOTE VOTE) can also die by the new media channels
and if you're making the case that this amounted to manipulation then we're going to get into a *very heavy* discussion about spacetime, entropy, free will and all sorts ...
i made a conscious decision to embrace the parameters of the choice, made a choice, and bought RATM ... becacuse Cowell seriously gets on my tits for a whole panoply of reasons which are probably too libellous to go into here (tip o' the hat to Messrs Hepworth and Lewry) and sometimes you have to take the tools available and use them to say "no" ...
the subsequent comments of media pundits, whose raison d'etre is to zoom off at a tangent and establish some sort of heterodoxy, don't bother me since that's what they're *supposed to do* ... (like hyperactive NME reviewers)...
hmm, anyway, i hope this was reasonably polite but i take umbrage, and possibly even umbrellas, at the assertion that i was manipulated ...
No problem Glenbervie
Read the last two sentences of my last post; if no-one speculated on others' motives this board would be very dull, and if no-one admitted that some of what they write is speculative it would be a lot less clubbable than it is.
You're right about the snobbery
But at least the whole story has provided a bit of interest to what had become a very stale process - win X Factor, have Christmas No 1. Neither song means much musically and the charts themselves are pretty pointless nowadays, but isn't there a tiny bit of you that liked seeing Simon Cowell's nose tweaked.
Simon Cowell
I'm vaguely interested that much of the debate seems to be about Simon Cowell rather than the guy who actually recorded the single. I heard him (McEldery) on the radio this morning and he seemed happy enough to have a single out at all, let alone one that was at number two in the pop charts. I say 'vaguely' interested because I didn't know or care what was #1 last week and I have barely any further interest in what's at the top of this week's list of trackes that have sold the most.
Actually
Brooker's line about people buying the X Factor single out of "sedated confusion" summed up exactly my feelings about the X Factor single. It's like people were saying, "So what are we buying now then? This? If we must..."
By contrast, the RATM song probably appealed to a whole new generation of teenagers who hadn't heard it and weren't even born when it was first released. I was 16 when it came out and remember how thrilling it sounded, especially the sweary bit.
I also discovered Anarchy in the UK and Derek and Clive at that age, and I imagine the teens who have just bought Killing in the Name feel the way I did then: "Where has this been all my life?"
'The same Guardian columnists...
... used to say the same things about Abba back in the day'.
Charlie Brooker was about 7 or 8 'back in the day'...
Well, okay
That's a good point, David. But I'm still far happier than I thought I'd be a week ago that some kind of genuine, effective sentiment has been expressed, en masse, against the domination of the Christmas chart by Cowell's mind-numbing celebration of melisma.
And I like it when Charlie Brooker rants about stuff.
It's a gift
It's impossible to underestimate how much of the X-factor single buying is done for gifts - as one of the last bastions of family TV viewing, the X-factor winner's CD single is an ideal inter-generational present, as you can't wrap up a download and give it to your granny on Christmas morning.
This is one of the reasons CDs won't die quite as quickly as we might think, though it's probable that it will be a certain type of artist who stays CD-centric (see Westlife, Susan Boyle, Michael Buble - actually anyone who releases an album after Halloween...)
Except
That 95% of sales in the singles chart are downloads. The CD version of the McElderry single was deleted after a single day in the shops.
Are you sure about that?
You can still buy a CD of last years X Factor winner. Send me your address and I'll post one?
Deleted
Basically means "no more re-orders". It doesn't mean "out of stock".
And thanks for the kind offer, but no thanks.
It really wasn't deleted on Day 1
Trust me, I know. Sony were still pressing and distrubuting to major accounts at the end of last week.
Ah well
Shows how much I know
I'm afraid I'm mean spirited enough to admit...
... that I am just happy that an X Factor muppet isn't number one. It's all rather like the ABU (Anyone But United) school of football supporting for me, this is ABC, anyone but Cowell. And jolly good as well. And if what it eventually means is that next year a Xenomania produced piece of pop genius is offered to the X Factor winner then even better, it's all win win.
This whole sorry affair so totally
joyless and frankly pathetic it's depressing and has given X factor loads of free publicity. Speaking as someone who doesn't have much time for either party it's has forced Xfactor into my life just a little but more. I hadn't heard the Climb single until the Today programme so cheers RATMites for that. The thing is extremely hollow and has very little to do with the fun thing that use to be pop music and everything to do with rather sad childish territorial pissing Hurray for the internet, Hurray for Simon Cowell.
Whereas
I have rather enjoyed it all.
well I'm happy for you
if such a slight occurrence brings you any form of entertainment a newly decorated hallway must seem like a 13 disc boxset!
And that's probably his business if it does.
Rein it in, eh?
f*ck you I won't do what you tell me to
One of those up arrows..
...was from me.
And there'll be another from St Winifred's Choir
in session later on
?
?
Hasn't it worked out well for both ?
I read somewhere that the X factor track still sold more than any other year even though it didn't make number one. Hasn't this whole think been beneficial to both in increasing sales ?
I'm sick of seeing the whole
I'm sick of seeing the whole thing over-analysed on the net by cooler-than-thou types from both sides. Ultimately, it's a bit of fun. I didn't really care either way but I do find the result quite funny.
Who
.
I
.
gives
.
for
.
a
.
one
.
toss
.
don't
.
?
.
Vulpes!
!
presumably everyone who commented above
- I think that's how these message board/blog/forum things work - but I may be a meringue.
In the same spirit...
...Cowell should have next year's X-Factor winner release a shmaltzty cover version of Killing In The Name.
Great idea
There must be some RATM easy listening tracks out there somewhere
Richard Cheese is da man...
Boring and horrible records
Well personally I think anyone with an ounce of sense and taste should ignore both of these boring and horrible records (not to mention the boring and babyish bleatings of Charlie Brooker) and listen instead to The Pearlfishers' delightful A Sunflower At Christmas, which is brimming with charm, beauty and seasonal good vibes.
http://open.spotify.com/album/55iyiQyE5eB4MjTcQ315nS
Agreed, about Charlie Brooker...
...and I'm a little surprised at him, as he normally reserves his vitriol for more deserving targets. By the way, I'll check out that tune by the Pearlfishers when I get home. Thanks Richard, and a Happy Christmas to you!
I like...
...the George Michael song. Its about Christmas. And it has a nice tune & stuff.
Season's Greetings!!!
Brooker
Like 90% of his fellow Guardianistas, my broad philsophy is that if Brooker's in favour of something then I'm agin' it. The only thing more nauseating than a Hannah Montana power ballad is the whiff of elitist sanctimony.
It was a diverting laugh
and raised over 70,000 for Shelter (so far. The rest is noise, End of. Amusing to see all these messageboards get so wound up about it though.
Its interesting that 20m people watched the X Factor Final but they couldn't pony up enough people to buy the end product. Seems to echo Mr H's point on the podcast about it being nothing to do with music.
*I'm being pulled into the discussion whirlpool! back! back!*
We've had some easy lsitening RATM so how about this for next year?
McElderry.......
How many other 18 year old guys from South Shields look that great and put themselves forward for X Factor type shows?
Either a Cheryl Tweedy stitch up or that lad has balls the size of water melons.
So when is...
Simon Cowell: Shit For Ears coming out?
I think
If a young lad from up - North gets a huge leg-up because he can actually belt out a good tune ( The Climb wasn't the only tune he got his tonsils around by the way ) , then what's wrong with that ? Do we begrudge him his 15mins of fame ?
Move on, people !
And seasons greetings to all !
But...
The single shows obvious signs of being processed with Autotune - so can he really sing?
I'm not daft enough to watch the X Factor itself, so I've no idea if Autotune was also used during the show.
All the contestants on
All the contestants on X-Factor sing live. Say what you like about young Joe but he can certainly hold a tune.
He can certainly sing
He just had no personality on the show. I suspect he won as a lot of people's second favourite and picked up votes as the more interesting contestants wre voted off. I love the show, and don't think I missed an episode, but during the first 5 or 6 live shows I was always momentarily nonplussed when Joe popped up to do his party piece, as I had completely fogotten about him again.
I feel a bit sorry for Joe
He's been deprived of a number one single and more as likely it'll never happen again. But at least he's taken it with good grace, unlike the lynch mob who started this silly campaign.
I think the time is coming when internet campaigns and Twitter flashmobs will not be taken remotely seriously or will just be ignored, because the people who take part in such things have been exposed as a bunch of mean-spirited or easily led hysterics jumping on some studenty stick-it-to-the-man bandwagon. It's ludicrous.
RATM may have shaken things up Christmas number one wise, but it's hardly festive or in the spirit of the season, is it?
Exactly.
Monopoly is what the festive season is all about.
It must be. We play it every year in our house.
"deprived of a number one single"
Hmm. A mass buying campaign started by two people on facebook stops a single, released on the back of a multi-million pound mass buying campaign/marketing push, from becoming number one. Mildly amusing to see SC put out slightly, but not exactly earth-shattering or permanent. Brooker, as always, is amusing but is sort of missing the point here.
I've nothing against the thingummybob, whoever he is (not an X Factor fan) so I'm not interested in buying that. However, neither will I buy into the herd mentality of buying a song just to stop Cowell. For the record, I like Killing In The Name, but I already have it and see no need to buy it again, thanks all the same. The X Factor single may have been bought by many who only buy a handful of records a year but, whether it's bovine idiocy or not, they chose to buy it and some people might, shock horror, even like it
I bought the Muppets' Bohemian Rhapsody video. Because I thought it was funny, and I liked it. I daresay quite a few people bought the RATM and thingy's songs for the same reasons.
Someone at Sony BMG must be killing themselves laughing right now, though...
Deprived of a number one single?
He'll be number one next week. Agree with the rest of your post, though.
Whatever
Any way to have the most vicious family disagreement. Monopoly's certainly a guaranteed way of doing that.
The one rule in Monopoly seems to be
Never read the rules. So, you end up with different "interpretations" of how it's supposed to be played, and frank exchanges of views on these.
The new X Factor game
will trounce Monopoly this Christmas.
"You are singing in memory of your handicapped brother, move forward three spaces."
"Rage Against the Machine beat you to Christmas number one, move back four."
More important
Let's start planning on just how we make sure the Love Trousers are next year's Christmas number one.
It'll be interesting to see
whether a similar attempt will be made next xmas to take over the festive number 1, or will we be snowed under with various bloggers/twitters attempting to undermine the evil of cowell?
Reckon Cowell should have gone with Joe's cover of Journey's, 'Don't Stop The Feeling', would have been number 1, rather than that wet effort that was released.
Lets pretend it's 1974
Let's pretend it's 1974 when people made proper Christmas records that were daft, fun and sounded great played loud at parties. And curse the tyranny of 'cool' which keeps this wonderful record off the radio
First gig I ever saw was by The Wombles...
Hampstead Heath, mid-1970s. But I always lie and say it was 10cc in 1983.
Why lie?
wish I'd seen The Wombles. Great pop songs - still love Remember You're a Womble even now. I'm going to slip it on iTunes RIGHT NOW.
You shouldn't mash up The Wombles
Only because...
I have no memory of it whatsoever, so I don't think it really counts. If I remembered it I would proud to nudge 10cc from their hallowed 'first gig' status.
Me too!
Lewisham, I think. Orinoco (or possibly Wellington, details sketchy) came up to dance with me and I was frightened. Next gig was A-ha at the Albert Hall (accompanying younger sister who was a fan). So I lie and say it was Ry Cooder at Wembley Arena.
Womble crumpet
Madame Cholet was a looker n'all.
An amateur Guardianista speaks
I totally agree with Charlie Brooker.
Neither song is a masterpiece but on balance RATMs hectoring 16-year old stomper is better than that wet, nondescript thing this boy is singing. Besides he'll go to number 1 during the January lull.
Simon Cowell has a nerve accussing people of bullying this protege when Cowells strategies involve bullying in several forms
- the sub-surface intimidation of his presence in general.
- the humiliation of others during his auditions.
- his dismissal of other panelists who disagree with him
(including his patronising sexism towards Ms Minouge/Mrs Cole)
- the emotional bullying of encouraging competitors to talk about
recently deceased relatives.
- not to mention his demands for more cash from ITV (who he knows are broke) despite the fact as someone has pointed out ITV are
already effectively paying him to do what he'd be doing for
a living anyway (even if he wasn't on tv).
On a broader perspective I think it's rather nice that the most conservative decade for pop music I've ever known has ended with an old school gesture of lefty truculence.
and it's the gesture that matters.
"an old school gesture of lefty truculence"
As Keir Hardie gazes down from the heavens, his chest swells with pride.
SC
Love him or hate him.....SC is only doing what most people WISH they could do, and that's make sheds loads of readys to make himself a rather comfortable life.
I personally don't contribute to his amassing of wealth, but if other folks do then it's their choice. Democracy is a wonderful thing.
Should Know Better
I downloaded the Rage Against The Machine "track", even though it's dreadful and I will never knowingly listen to it again. I love The X Factor and watch it every week. The whole kerfuffle just seemed like a hoot. I am 50 years old.
This...
...is the best comment I've seen or heard on the subject, anywhere.
Joe seems like such a nice guy
Hang on, I'm a nice guy! Where's my number one hit single????
PS. I lied. I'm not that nice
Passed me by completely
I am mildly amused by the whole affair now that I know about it, but it hardly has the excitement of Slade vs. Wizzard in 1973. Two great pop records in a good-natured battle for the top spot. Next year, can we try a campaign to re-enact this?
Charlie Brooker
is right about everything, apparently.
Except when he's not.
Like in this instance.
Stop Press! - saccharine pop ballad by pretty teen singer backed by a svengali in danger of getting to number one at Christmas!
All of it is a load of old bollocks
both songs are only being bought because people are being told to.
no one cares about the charts apart from this week, when it's even more meaningless than the others as no one buys anything that they actually may like, even just a tad.
in the end, why should we care about what song has outsold another one. music is meant for pleasure and there is nothing pleasureable about any of this bollocks. just finger pointing, my dad's bigger than your dad crap.
by the way both songs are utter utter........